Geo Metro halved for better mileage

[Doug Heffron] modified this 1989 Geo Metro way back in 1993. Gas prices had just started breaking $1.00/gallon and he wanted to show manufacturers how to build a fuel efficient vehicle in such troubling times. The car already got 58mpg (Prius: 46mpg), but [Doug] decided he could do better with some aero modifications. The car was converted to tandem seating and stripped of any extra weight. In its final form, it got 75mpg, but then gas prices stabilized and it was laid to rest in a shed. You can find out more about the car and see photos from the build on its site (painful resizing).

Getting higher gas mileages isn’t that hard to do. Cars could be produced that get up to the 60~70 mpg range by stripping off all the heavy protective framework. But those cars would get destroyed in accidents, and never meet the required safety standards to be put into production.

Recently though, they’ve started designing cars to ‘crumble’ in a controlled fashion, to improve crash ratings while remaining light, but are still fairly expensive. Or you could make your own and just pray you never get hit.

This car could make a great base for an electric conversion. It’s already light and low drag, and with all the space on the passenger side for the battery box, and posible a generator for series hibrid use, you could get some serious range.

There is street legal and legal to sell in large scale. In most States if the car retains the basic safety items to pass annual inspection, along with the emissions inspection, modified cars generally are considered street legal. Then of course the is my home State Kansas that has no annual vehicle inspections of any kind. However that doesn’t mean you can get by not having basic safety items if LE notes that there not there.

As far back as 1974 cars where designed so the sheet metal crumple to absorb the crash energy. The fact that a car has terrible looking damage after an accident doesn’t really mean that car is inherently unsafe.

I have to be sure a person capable of creating custom transmission gears, would also be able to retain the car’s crash safety features.

Both the manufacturers and the vehicle buyers share the blame. Even if the manufacturer did offer economical auto, the buyer gets rid of them the moment it becomes affordable to consume more. Perhaps that’s about to change as gas here in the US moves onto $5

The main site for this car was removed a few years ago but we have made a new one for the car and other things that Doug Heffron has built. http://www.dougheffron.com/car.html
PS the car is still on the road